It's a Team Effort
by Zana Zira
Summary: It isn't easy being the Winchester brothers, especially when they're just kids. Life is fast-paced and unstable, Dad is never there, and Dean feels like Sammy's entire future rests on his shoulders. But even Dean isn't always able to protect his brother from some of the cruelest monsters of all - other people - and that makes him feel like a real failure. Wee!chesters, NO WINCEST.


**Author's Note: This was written for _Unattainable Dreams'_ one-word prompt challenge. My one-word prompt was "loser." I hope you enjoy this story; I know I enjoyed writing it!**

* * *

"Come on, Sammy. Get up or we'll be late for school again." Dean strode over to his little brother's bed and yanked the old, threadbare comforter off of him, earning a protesting whine in response. Dean grinned a little in spite of himself; Sam might have been almost nine years old, but he was still a lot more innocent and childish than Dean had been at that age. "Up and at 'em, Sam," Dean said in his best Dad voice when the younger Winchester stayed where he was. It was a lot less intimidating than the real thing, though, especially since the thirteen-year-old's voice was becoming a little raspier and squeakier every day while it began to change. "I already got detention once because you made me late, and I don't wanna do it again."

"Wasn't 'cause of me," Sam mumbled sleepily, rubbing his eyes and lowering his feet to the floor. The apartment was so old that the shag carpet, which was dated to begin with, was a nasty shade of gray instead of the pale green it had been originally. Dean had discovered that one day while cleaning up a spill on the carpet, shocked to find that the more he scrubbed, the more grey grime came off of the floor until it was pea-green. He hadn't let Sam walk around the floors without socks on after that. "You always get detention anyway."

"I do not, bitch."

"Jerk." Dean smiled and walked over to the closet, sighing when the sliding door fell off its rusty hinges – again – and fell loudly to the floor. He made a mental note to fix that later – again – and tossed Sammy a shirt and a pair of jeans before getting himself dressed. When Sam went into the bathroom to brush his teeth and fix the unruly mop on his head that he called hair, Dean ate a protein bar and sighed, hearing the way the pipes squeaked and groaned and threatened to bust at any moment. Even though they'd only lived here for a month, he had already had to stop up several leaks in the pipes, but duct tape would only last so long before he needed to patch up his patch-ups, and it was getting exhausting.

He knew Dad had wanted to stay in this town a little longer than usual and that's why he had rented this crappy little apartment, but Dean wondered if he couldn't have maybe found something a little bit better. Half of the electrical sockets didn't work, the lights were always flickering, the water only heated up sometimes, and the majority of the closet and cabinet doors in the place were falling off of their hinges every other day. He and Sam were here alone most of the week since Dad was usually off on some hunt or another, and Dean was always worried something weird was going to happen to Sam, like the wiring causing a fire or the ceiling fan falling on him while he slept or something. The strange sounds this place made gave Sam nightmares, so he had recently taken to sharing Dean's bed with him. The older Winchester would never admit it, but it actually made him feel a little better at night, too; holding his brother close and making sure nothing happened to him made everything just a little more bearable, and it had ever since the night they lost Mom.

"Hey, Sammy, you almost done in there?" Dean shouted through the door when he heard the water still running. "You don't hafta look like Miss America, you know, just your usual girly self."

"Oh, ha ha," Sam answered, turning the sink off and opening the door. "I'm ready. Let's go to school." Dean nodded and fell silent, hoisting his worn-out backpack over one shoulder and tossing Sam his along with a granola bar.

"You remember your lunch money?" he asked as he shooed Sam out the door, locking it carefully once they were both out. Sam nodded, and the conversation died almost completely while they made their way up the street to the school three blocks away. It wasn't busy out right now; little towns like this one in Missouri weren't exactly famous for being overcrowded. Since the town was pretty small, Sam and Dean went to different sections of one school. Sam was already showing a love for school that Dean had never had; he did really well on all the tests, studied hard, and showed a general interest in wanting to know as much about everything as he could. Dean had never liked all of that academic stuff. It wasn't that he was stupid or anything, he just preferred using practical knowledge he got from Dad, not learning about how to find the missing side lengths of triangles.

And while Sam had made some friends in school already, Dean was still completely alone except for his brother. Both of them had always sort of been outcasts, shunned because they were always "the new kids" in every school they went to and left town before they'd had time to make any real friends. And try as he might to be outgoing, Dean was simply ignored by most of the people around him, if not outright rejected. It had made him reluctant to befriend anyone, and he watched over Sam almost obsessively, fiercely protective of his little brother and desperate to make sure he had a more normal life than he himself would ever be able to have. That fierceness had started getting him into trouble, and he picked fights and got into detention on a regular basis. It didn't really matter to him, though. They wouldn't be here by next month, most likely, so what did he care what everyone thought of him?

He was snapped out of this train of thought when he felt Sam tug on the sleeve of his shirt.

"Huh? You say something, Sammy?" he asked distractedly. Sam rolled his eyes and let go of Dean's sleeve, already perfecting the bitch-face he would use for the rest of his life.

"I asked if you were going to follow me around forever or if you were going to class," Sam repeated. "We passed your building two minutes ago."

"Oh, uh, yeah," Dean answered, running a hand through his hair and clearing his throat. "Right. Get to class and stay outta trouble, bitch." Sam smiled and punched his arm lightly.

"Yeah, yeah. See you at lunch, jerk. Try not to get suspended before then."

"You're hilarious."

Sam stuck his tongue out at Dean and walked toward the front door of the elementary building, and Dean laughed, turned on his heel and made his way toward the middle school section. When he reached it he sighed, steeling himself, and opened the door slowly.

"Can't wait 'til this damn day is over…"

* * *

Aside from a few snarky comments about his ratty clothes from the boys around him – "Where'd you get that shirt, Winchester, the city dump?" – the morning passed without incident for Dean. He was glad in a way, but it left him bored out of his mind. He didn't really care about what the teacher was saying at the front of the room, but he had to bite back a laugh when she said they would soon be reading Dracula and writing a paper on it. Dean could write a paper over all the things that were completely bogus about that book if he really wanted to; Dad could tell him all he wanted to know about vampires and then some. But he shrugged it off and took the enormous, heavy, worn-out literature book his teacher loaned him, stuffing it into his backpack and heading for the lunchroom. He was starving, and he knew Sammy would have already bought a sandwich and milk and found a place for them to sit by the time Dean got there. He didn't know how the kid always got there that much faster than he did, but it always happened without fail.

"Maybe he teleports or something," Dean muttered to himself, strangely glad to hear the sound of his own voice. Even if it was just his imagination, it at least made it sound like someone was talking _to_ him, instead of just talking _around_ him and pretending he wasn't even there. Sam might be able to make it for long periods of time without talking to people much, but Dean just wasn't that way; he needed constant companionship, support, reassurance, even though he vehemently denied that fact. That was why he always looked forward to lunch with Sam. The two of them could sit on opposite sides of the table, never saying a word, and yet know everything about what the other was feeling.

So when Dean walked into the lunchroom today, he immediately sensed that something was off with Sam, and it raised his hackles immediately. He quickly scanned the room for the source of his unease, his gaze resting on his brother when he spotted him on the other side of the room. Dean's eyes narrowed to slits when he saw the look on Sammy's face; even from the other side of the room, Dean could see him fighting valiantly not to burst into tears while another boy shouted something at him. He was in full-on big brother mode in an instant, dashing through the middle of the room until he reached Sam and placed a firm hand on his shoulder.

"Sammy? What's going on?" he asked softly, watching in satisfaction when the other boy backed up a couple of steps in the face of Dean's glare.

"D-Dean… I…"

"It's okay. You can tell me, you know that."

"Dean, is Mom gone because of me?" Sam's voice was soft, barely a whisper, and it was obvious that he was speaking through tears that were warring with him to break free.

"…What?" Dean stared at Sam incredulously.

"Was it my fault? Mikey was saying that Mom left because sh-she wished I wasn't ever born, and that's w-why Dad… Dad's always g-gone…" Dean stood still for a second, hearing Sam's voice choking up and feeling like he had just been punched in the stomach.

"You little son of a –!" Dean roared, charging at the younger boy and pinning him against the wall by the collar of his shirt. "You wanna run that by me again, huh? You wanna tell me you think our mom didn't love us? Didn't love Sam? Come on, tough guy! Say it again! I dare you!" The younger boy stared wide-eyed at Dean, tears of fear pooling in his eyes when Dean shook him roughly. "Oh, so you got nothin' to say to me now, huh? Can't pick on someone bigger than you?"

"Dean, stop…" Sam whispered, his eyes wide as he pulled at Dean's sleeve. "You'll get in trouble again, and –"

"I don't care, Sam! He had _no_ right to say that to you! _No_ right! I'm gonna teach this little punk never to mess w –"

Dean was completely caught off guard when a fist smashed into the side of his face, blacking his eye and splitting the skin over his cheekbone before sending him crashing to the floor. He heard Sam scream his name, and then he was roughly jerked up by the collar of his shirt, held up above the floor by a boy of fifteen or sixteen – a ninth grader, if Dean had to hazard a guess. He thought his name might be Ray, but he couldn't really remember.

"You think you can go around threatening my little brother, bastard?" the older boy snarled in a deeper voice than Dean's, dropping him to the floor and shoving him roughly. Dean clenched his jaw, speaking his next words through gritted teeth; being called a bastard was the one insult that ever really stung him.

"After what he said to Sam, you're lucky I didn't flat-out kill him." Ray punched Dean again, snapping his head back and splitting his lip; from the way blood began to drip from his nose, it was probably broken. He chuckled, feeling the blood drip into his mouth from the split lip, and spat in the older boy's face.

An instant later, both of them were on the ground, nothing more than a tangle of flailing limbs and screamed obscenities. Sam and Mikey both watched in terrified fascination as their brothers fought, not even noticing that a crowd had begun to gather around the older boys. Dean seemed to be winning, but just barely; Ray was a lot bigger than him, and his size plus the fact that he had gotten two hits on Dean before they started put the older Winchester at a disadvantage. They traded blows, blocking and punching and trying to grab each other in as tight a hold as they could, but neither was really making much progress.

Dean heard Sam shout at him to just quit, that this guy wasn't worth it, but it was too late for that. Someone had hurt his baby brother and they were going to _pay_. As John had once told him while he prepared to leave for a hunt, "In this world, you can either be a winner or a loser. There's no in-between, and if you lose you're as good as dead." He had, of course, been referring to winning against a Wendigo at the time, but Dean was still not about to lose. When Ray tried to punch him again, Dean grabbed his arm and threw him to the ground, pinning him underneath his smaller body. What he didn't expect was for Ray to know how to free himself, and he did it so quickly that Dean was the one pinned before he even knew how it had happened.

"_Dad would kill me for getting caught so easily,_" he thought as he struggled to get loose. A moment later, he gasped in pain when his arm was twisted so far behind him that he felt the bones creaking under the strain. With a sickening snap, he felt his elbow break, and he fought the urge to vomit as his arm continued to be wrenched behind him, sending jolts of agony through his whole body. He knew he was screaming now, but he couldn't hear it; his pulse was too loud in his ears.

"You pathetic loser," Ray snarled in Dean's ear as he watched him writhe. "You can't even stick up for your own brother properly. What good are you, huh?"

"Sh-shut up…" Dean choked out, trying to wriggle free and crying out again when all it did was make his elbow hurt.

Suddenly, almost miraculously, the pressure on his arm released, and he felt the weight of the older boy slip off of him when he collapsed onto the floor in a heap. Confused, Dean blinked the black dots out of his eyes and looked around, his jaw dropping when he saw Sammy standing where Ray had been, his fist still raised where it had connected with the sixteen-year-old's temple. Before he could say anything, Sam was pulling on his good arm, hoisting him up and tugging him along while they ran toward home like the Devil himself was after them.

As soon as they got inside and locked the door, Dean sank to the floor, cradling his arm against his chest and panting as he tried not to pass out. Sammy grabbed the phone and made a quick call to Dad, leaving a message to let him know what had happened and that they weren't going to school anymore. Dean was pretty sure Sam would get killed for deciding that on his own, but he wasn't in any condition to argue that now. Finally, the younger Winchester turned to Dean, his face worried and his eyes a little too shiny.

"Hospital time?" he asked quietly, watching Dean's face pale a little before he sighed and nodded.

"Hell. Yes."

* * *

It turned out they didn't end up going back to school after all. John finished his hunt early and made it back home the same night Sam called, meeting both boys at the hospital and taking in the thick cast on Dean's arm with a resigned sigh. He'd be out of commission for a while as far as hunting went, but at least he didn't need surgery. He'd been really angry with Dean at first, thinking he had started trouble for no reason, but when Sammy interrupted the middle of their argument and told John what had happened, even the seasoned hunter wanted to beat those two kids up.

John had let it go after that, and not a week later they had packed up everything they owned, which wasn't much, and loaded it into the Impala in preparation to hit the road again. There were still a few things left that were too heavy for Sam to get and Dean couldn't lift with one arm, so John told the younger boy to go wait for him by the car.

The Impala was pretty much the only constant thing in their lives besides each other, so it really wasn't a surprise that that's where Sam found Dean, sitting in the back seat and staring absently out the front windshield. When Sam slid in beside him, Dean glanced at him and then looked away, as if trying not to make eye contact. He had been doing this since he got out of the hospital, and it was really starting to worry Sam. Had he done something to make his brother mad?

"Dean?" Sam asked quietly.

"What?" The response was quiet, monotone, disinterested.

"Are you mad at me?"

"No."

"Then what's wrong?"

"Don't worry about it, Sammy. I'm fine."

"You're not fine!" Sam snapped, pulling on Dean's shirt in an effort to turn the other boy toward him. "You don't talk to me anymore, and it's scaring me. What did I do?"

"It's not anything you did, Sammy," Dean whispered, turning his head away again. "It's me. Something I did."

"Huh? Dean, what are you talking about?" Dean sighed heavily.

"You shouldn't have had to save my ass like that, Sam. I'm your older brother; it's _my_ job to protect _you_. That's what Dad expects too, and I failed both of you. If that guy hadn't been just a human I could've gotten both of us killed. Ray was right, I am a loser." His voice broke on the last word, and he bit his lip to keep it from shaking. A moment later he tensed, feeling Sam wrap his arms around him in a tight hug and lay his face against Dean's arm.

"You're not a loser, Dean." Dean snorted and rolled his eyes, trying not to let the tears in them spill over. "You're not! Not winning every fight doesn't make you a loser."

"I don't think that's how Dad sees it."

"Well then Dad's full of shit!"

"Don't cuss like that. You're too young."

"Then don't call yourself a loser. You protect me all the time, and you always say it's just 'cause you 'did what needed to be done.' Well this time,_ I _did what needed to be done. Okay? I'm a Winchester too, Dean, and I'm not a baby anymore. I can protect you too, sometimes." He pulled away from Dean to look him in the eyes. "You'll never be a loser to me, Dean. Not ever. Okay? You're my big brother, and I think you're awesome."

Dean swallowed thickly and wrapped his arms around Sam, hugging him tight and sniffling loudly. He hoped he could pull it together before John got out to the car; after all, he was the one who invented the "no chick-flick moments" rule. Sam didn't move at all or try to pull away; he just let Dean hug him, patting his back while he got himself together. He might not be able to hunt like Dad and Dean yet, but this much, at least, he could do. A few minutes later, Dean pulled away, sniffling a few more times and wiping his eyes on his sleeve.

"Thanks, Sam…" he whispered, looking out the window again. "And if you tell anyone I just cried all over you I will end you. Got it?"

"You were crying?" Sam asked, giving Dean his best clueless look. Dean smiled, straightening his face out when John finally opened the car door and got in. When the Impala was out of the apartment complex and John was focused on driving, Dean whispered to Sam again.

"Thanks, bitch."

"You're welcome, jerk."


End file.
